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THE ALLEYNIAN 710
The Glasgow art scene: a force to be reckoned with
The Upper School Art students’ trip to Glasgow was an inspiration, says Mary Jo Doherty
Glasgow is renowned as a centuries-old creative furnace within which world-leading artists, musicians and writers have been forged, and a trip to the city over the Michaelmas half-term provided 21 Upper School art students with a widescreen view of the city’s ongoing creative energy. At the Sharmanka Kinetic Theatre in the heart of Trongate, hundreds of carved and painted figures and pieces of reclaimed mechanical scrap metal were choreographed in sync against a haunting musical backdrop to create an incredible light show, retelling tragic folklore stories. GoMA’s ‘Drink in the Beauty’ prompted us to think about our connections to nature within the landscape and our responses to global injustices, setting the scene for the COP26 conference and allowing us to consider these issues ahead of our own College Eco Week. The Common Guild, a new space re-claimed within a disused primary school, offered our students access to a world-class contemporary art experience with the heartbreakingly confessional and intimate video work of US artist Sharon Hayes, via a suite of three films in specific corners of the gallery space. No visit to Glasgow would ever be complete without discovering more about world-renowned architect and Glasgow native Charles Rennie Mackintosh. The Hunterian’s recreation of his own beloved (now demolished) house is a fitting tribute to his design canon, remarkable then, as now, for its disciplined decorative austerity. Equally impressive, the Necropolis, a Victorian garden cemetery perched upon a hill in the east end of Glasgow, is one of the city’s most atmospheric settings. The view from the hill was a perfect drawing spot from which to document some of the sprawling
suburbs of Scotland’s largest city, and was well worth the walk from the city centre. At the Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum, it was hard to separate the interior and exterior, both equally inspiring, and after our brisk yet bracing hill walk, the Floating Heads installation hanging over the foyer provided another well-timed drawing opportunity. An unexpected and impromptu reconnection with Alex Misick OA led to a private viewing at the Centre for Contemporary Arts, where he is currently Projects and Digital Director; it was timely for our students to see their future potential selves in a creative context. The Modern Institute presented the sublime work of painter Victoria Morton and Turner Prize-winner and proud Glaswegian Martin Boyce. Morton’s richly layered canvases explored the organic nature of paint against the dramatic peeling surfaces of the space’s industrial past, while Boyce’s carefully curated intersecting walls created a disorientating environment in which our artists encountered a labyrinth of re-imagined telephones, chairs and doors, to conjure a strange domestic life lost in the age of communication. Later that day, in what was a highlight of the trip, we visited Boyce’s own studio, where he spoke candidly and with real integrity about his practice and his strong ancestral connection to the Glaswegian art scene. Rightly famed for its culture and people, Glasgow revealed to the students its charms as a city clearly proud of its history. Its passion and integrity in relation to the creative arts were impossible to ignore, and will give our emerging Upper School artists plenty to reflect and act upon as they continue their own creative conversations on this side of the border.
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